This summer, two Kazakh microfinance organizations (MFOs) completed their transformation into banks — KMF, the country’s largest microfinance institution, and BNK Finance Kazakhstan, one of the top 15 largest lenders in the sector.
As of the end of March 2025, a total of 213 microfinance organizations were operating in Kazakhstan, with a combined loan portfolio of 1.65 trillion tenge — up 6.3% from the previous quarter and 30.2% higher compared with March 2024.
KMF accounted for 17.5% of the sector’s loan portfolio (down from 20% in March 2024), while BNK Finance held a 1.3% share — a sizeable figure considering the number of players in the microcredit market.
With the exit of KMF and BNK Finance Kazakhstan, the leaders among Kazakhstan’s microfinance organizations are now those specializing in auto loans — Toyota Financial Services Kazakhstan and MyCar Finance, whose loan portfolios reached 216.6 billion and 166.5 billion tenge, respectively, as of the end of March 2025.
Rounding out the top three is OnlineKazFinance with the Solva brand (139.5 billion tenge), which has also expressed interest in converting into a bank. However, this requires regulatory approval, which the MFO has not yet received. It is worth noting that Solva, like KMF, operates as a “universal” microfinance organization, lending to both businesses and individuals.
Even without factoring in the transformation of the two MFOs, the microcredit market has recently shifted toward auto loans and payday lending. For example, Lending and Financy Technologies with the DengiClick brand, which specializes in payday loans, entered the top five lenders on the market after KMF’s exit. Four other online microfinance organizations also made it into the top 20. Moreover, payday lenders consistently rank among the most profitable by net income, with Robocash.kz under the Zaimer brand standing out as the absolute leader for several years, even though by loan portfolio size it only closes out the top 10 MFOs in Kazakhstan.
Let’s turn to the companies that have moved into the banking sector. As of the end of March this year, KMF’s loan portfolio stood at 188.6 billion tenge — 2.5% higher than in the previous quarter and 13.9% greater than at the end of the first quarter of 2024. BNK Finance Kazakhstan’s portfolio amounted to 21 billion tenge, up 4.9% over the quarter and 11.6% year on year.
Both MFOs focused primarily on business lending. At KMF, more than 90% of the loan book was made up of loans to legal entities and agricultural enterprises, with consumer loans accounting for less than 10%. BNK Finance Kazakhstan followed a similarly business-oriented model. After their conversion into banks, both companies are expected to remain focused mainly on small and medium-sized businesses.
However, entrepreneurs for whom microfinance organizations are the only source of funding may now face serious challenges in securing capital to expand existing businesses or launch new ventures. Current clients of KMF and BNK Finance Kazakhstan will continue to be served, but now as bank customers, while entrepreneurs who had not previously worked with them may encounter tougher processing compared with the microfinance market.
For reference: at the end of the first quarter of this year, loans to legal entities and individual entrepreneurs accounted for only 16.2% of the total loan portfolio of Kazakhstan’s MFOs, or 266.3 billion tenge, with the remainder going to consumer microloans. With KMF and BNK Finance Kazakhstan exiting the microfinance market, the share of retail microloans is set to become more dominant, further distancing the MFO sector from its original mission of supporting small business.
